Always a Woman
by People Person I'm Not
Summary: The Doctor thinks on his relationship with River Song.


_She can kill with a smile_

_She can wound with her eyes_

_And she can ruin your faith with her casual lies_

_And she only reveals what she wants you to see_

_She hides like a child_

_But she's always a woman to me_

_She can lead you to love_

_She can take you or leave you_

_And she can ask for the truth_

_But she'll never believe you_

_And she'll take what you give her as long as it's free_

_She steals like a thief_

_But she's always a woman to me_

_Oh, she takes care of herself_

_She can wait if she wants_

_She's ahead of her time_

_Oh, and she never gives out_

_And she never gives in_

_She just changes her mind_

_She will promise you more_

_Than the Garden of Eden_

_Then she'll carelessly cut you_

_And laugh while you're bleeding_

_But she'll bring out the best_

_And the worst you can be_

_Blame it all on yourself_

'_Cause she's always a woman to me_

_Oh, she takes care of herself_

_She can wait if she wants_

_She's ahead of her time_

_Oh, and she never gives out_

_And she never gives in_

_She just changes her mind_

_She is frequently kind_

_And she's suddenly cruel_

_She can do as she pleases_

_She's nobody's fool_

_But she can't be convicted_

_She's earned her degree_

_The most she will do_

_Is throw shadows at you_

_But she's always a woman to me_

River Song. A wonderful enigma to the Doctor. She seemed to know so much about him, yet he had never seen her before in his life. She was from his future, which meant he should be running, as he so often did. But the completeness and absolute assurance with which she trusted him made him stay. Why did she trust him that much? She had been willing to die for him. She _had_ died for him, with a final repetition of that phrase she kept saying—"spoilers." He had saved her to the data core, but he could never see her again. Except…she had said he would. Past versions of her, meeting up with future versions of him. And future him trusted her with all his being. She knew his _name_. There was only one person he would have told his name to. And that, in a way, frightened him more than anything, the knowing of how important she would one day be to him. He should have known from the start that she knew future him, really—"hello, sweetie," a far too affectionate and familiar greeting for a stranger, or even a casual acquaintance. No, she had to be someone really special to him. He already had an idea. And, if he was perfectly honest, he couldn't wait to find out.

The graffitied home box had caught his eye to begin with. Add to that the fact that the graffiti was in _Old High Gallifreyan_, the lost language of the Time Lords, and how could he resist? She must have known that. Of course she did. Sometimes he thought she knew him better than he knew himself. She had called out to him and he had come, saving her, just as she knew he would. He had tried to run from her, but Amy made him stay…and then she hit the nail on the head. She worked out who River Song was—"Mrs. Doctor from the future." River did very well helping to defeat the Angels. And then she had said that maybe she had done enough to earn a pardon. Father Octavian said she had killed a man, a very good man, a hero. She herself had said that the man she had killed had been the best man she knew. And no one would tell him who this man had been. Just another of River's seemingly endless mysteries.

She had graffitied the oldest cliff face in the universe. As messages went, it was not a subtle one. Then, when he had reached her, she was disguised as Cleopatra, of all people. She always did have a flair for the dramatic. And then they went off to Stonehenge, to the opening of the Pandorica. He and Amy had stayed behind, to try and figure out the secret of the Pandorica, and River had gone in the TARDIS. She had been the first one to realize they had walked into a trap. Then she had been trapped herself, in what had always been a safe haven—the TARDIS itself. The burning, dying, exploding TARDIS. Stuck in an endless loop. When he had realized what the sun was, he had listened closer and heard one phrase repeated over and over—"I'm sorry, my love." She seemed so sure she was stuck. When he rescued her, with no more than a nonchalant, "Hi, honey, I'm home." She replied, as she would again in his future, "And what sort of time do you call this?" And then she shot his fez. His _fez_. She was there when he restarted the universe. And then he saw her again after Amy and Rory's wedding, asking her if she was married. _That _got complicated…

She had made her entrance by shooting his Stetson. What did she have against his hats? It had been nice to see her, he had to admit, even with the abrupt greeting. Of course, he had already realized she was a good enough aim to not blow him to kingdom come with an errant shot. They had picnicked on the beach, him and her and Amy and Rory. Then the astronaut had arrived, and, well, all he had to go off of was the very, very little he had been told. After it had properly killed him, she had shot it until her gun clicked empty. She had helped burn his body. Then, upon returning to the diner…_he_ had been there. Two hundred years younger. She had slapped him, furious with him for something he hadn't yet done. But that was the life of a time traveler. They had decided to go to 1969, had in fact landed in the Oval Office itself. They had gone to Florida, to figure out the terrified child calling from there. She had given him a spoiler to live in his dreams—"Oh, I'm quite the screamer." He couldn't help but wonder how that played in to their relationship…but he had to focus, not get distracted by the fabulous River Song. When Canton was hunting her and the Ponds, she jumped off a building. But as he said himself, "Don't worry…she does that." Of course he caught her. It seemed to be his job. And when the Silence got Amy, and they went to rescue her, he had gotten to flirt with her. Of course, she was an expert and he wasn't, not so much, but all the same… When he had taken her back to Stormcage she had called him back before he could leave, and, much to his surprise, kissed him. He had flailed awkwardly, not quite sure where to put his hands—not quite sure _where_ he could put his hands—not quite sure what he was supposed to do—surprised and terrified and excited to be kissing _River Song_—and very, very shocked. Her face when they separated, when she realized they had never kissed before, broke his hearts. But at the same time he was so excited. He would get to kiss her again.

She had been _late_. He had _always_ come when she called—even before he even knew who she was—and the one time he needed her more than anything, she _hadn't come_. Not until the end. Not until they had already taken Melody Pond, Amy and Rory's baby, the child of his best friends. They were going to raise poor Melody as a weapon to kill him, raise her without the love and affection she would get from the Ponds, and use her to kill him. And River, who could have prevented it, hadn't come. He had been furious when she had finally decided to show up. She criticized his plan, told him off for not doing enough, said _he_ could have prevented it, told him that he had become the exact opposite of what his name meant. When he had demanded to know who she was, she skirted the question, excitedly pulling him off to see his old cot. She said she hadn't seen it in a very long time. He wondered when she had seen it before. He had demanded once again to know who she was, and then she told him. It had shocked him and excited him and made him love her all the more. River Song was the very child they had lost, the very child they had fought so hard that day to save. River Song was Melody Pond.

He had been looking for Melody. Not River. They knew where River was—Stormcage, safe and sound. No, he had been looking for the baby Melody. He had come to Amy and Rory, and met their strange friend Mels…if met was the right word. Hit with "her" car then threatened at gunpoint by her was more the accurate description. They had gone off to Nazi Germany, and there, after Adolf Hitler sort of accidentally shot Mels, he realized that he had found Melody after all—right where she belonged, with her parents. Kind of. Mels, short for Melody. Amy said she had named her daughter after her. But really, Amy had named her daughter after…her daughter. Melody was part Time Lord, enough to regenerate. And regenerate she did—into River. Or someone who _looked_ like River. She wasn't quite River yet. He kept talking as if she was River—saying River's name, talking about her. She got so fed up with him—"Oh, River, River. More than a friend, I think." She tried to shoot him. More than once. But he outsmarted her. And then she so cruelly outsmarted him. She poisoned him with a kiss, then ran off once he realized he was dying. Amy and Rory found her, and he followed. He died there, died at her hand. Then she finally realized who River was. She saw River, as portrayed by the Teselecta, and saw herself. She saved him, then. Gave him all her remaining regeneration energy. As she had before kissed him to kill him, she this time kissed him to give him life.

"'What happened to time?' 'A woman.'" "'What's she like?' 'Hell. In high heels.'" In refusing to kill him—and his death was a fixed point that had to happen—River had created a parallel universe, one in which all of time was happening at once, and yet all _their_ time had never happened, even though they could remember it. He had found her, well, Amy had found him, and brought him to her, at Area 52, in the pyramids at Giza, and they had flirted. She was protective of him—Cleopatra had mentioned him. When he asked what it was she had, the answer turned out to be "Put down that gun." And he knew exactly what he needed to do to restart time. It was seemingly the only time River wouldn't let him touch her. She had him handcuffed—why was it _always_ him, her, and handcuffs?—so he couldn't touch her. She had brought him to the very top of the pyramid, and proved to him that he did matter to the universe, that so many races out there would come to help him. He still knew what needed to happen, though, and he knew the perfect way to do it. He married her. Wrapped their hands in the convenient strip of fabric that was his bow tie and married her. Finally he knew for sure that River Song was his wife. They restarted time with a kiss, and this time she knew that she could kill him, for it wasn't exactly properly him.

He had been a reading a book—a rather "yowzah!"-inducing book—and that's how he had found her. She had met Rory in the 1930's in New York City, and he and Amy had followed. He had found her held tight in the grasp of an Angel, and knew there were only two ways to get her out—break either her wrist or the Angel's. Unwilling to hurt her, yet not daring to hurt the Angel, he let her find her own way out. She broke her own wrist, then tried so hard to hide it from him. But he couldn't stand to see her hurt, and so healed her—resulting in a lovely slap across the face. They faced down the Angels, and them Amy and Rory did the unthinkable—created a paradox, one that would have killed them had they failed—to kill the Angels. But it hadn't been enough. One Angel, a rogue Angel that had escaped the paradox, had gotten Rory. And Amy, after all they had been through, decided she couldn't live without him. She had bid him farewell, bid River farewell, and let the Angel take her, too. Her last words had been to him, and her last words to her daughter about him. He had crumpled, struck down by the force of losing his best friends, but his wonderful River had kept him safe, kept her eyes on the Angel despite losing her parents. She was so strong, so much stronger that he could be.

Trenzalore. The one place he could never go. And yet he hadn't been given a choice. He had been forced to Trenzalore, and there he had seen her grave. He knew she couldn't be buried there—she had died at the Library—but it still hit him hard, harder than he ever thought. She had been there, linked to Clara, talking to him through the mystery girl, and he had been able to hear her. He had to ignore her. Not through any amount of not caring. It was really caring too much that was the reason he couldn't look at her, couldn't speak to her. He loved River Song. And to recognize her presence, then have it torn from him all over again…it would have destroyed him. Then he was forced to. Forced to see her there, speak to her, touch her. And then let her go. He knew the saying. "If you love something, let it go." But he knew that this was the last time he would ever let her go, the last time he would see her. "See you around, Professor River Song." He couldn't let it be true.


End file.
